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Crumbs from the Table of Joy

BRIEF BIOGRAPHY OF LYNN NOTTAGE

Lynn Nottage was born in 1964 in Brooklyn to schoolteacher and principal Ruby Nottage and
child psychologist Wallace Nottage. She attended Fiorella H. LaGuardia High School (which
specializes in visual and performing arts), during which time she wrote The Darker Side of
Verona, her first full-length play. Nottage went on to earn her bachelor’s degree from Brown
University, followed by an MFA from the Yale School of Drama in 1989. After this, Nottage
worked at Amnesty International’s press office and went on to write several plays—most
notably Intimate ApparIntimate Apparelel; Ruined; By the Way, Meet Vera Stark; and
SweatSweat. She earned her DFA from Brown in 2011 and has received honorary degrees
from Julliard and Albright College. Nottage is married to Tony Gerber, with whom she has
two children; she and Gerber are cofounders of Market Road Films production company.
Nottage won Pulitzers for both Ruined and SweatSweat, making her the first and only woman
to win the Pulitzer Prize for Drama twice. She’s also the recipient of a MacArthur “Genius
Grant” Fellowship, a Merit and Literature Award from The Academy of Arts and Letters, and
a Guggenheim Grant, among several other awards and honors. Nottage is currently a
professor of playwriting at Columbia University.
HISTORICAL CONTEXT

Crumbs from the Table of Joy is set in a period now known as the Second Red Scare, which
was characterized by a pervasive fear in the United States of communism and certain
progressive liberal ideals. The main concern was that the United States had been infiltrated
by covert communists who intended to upend American society with socialist practices and
ideas. The hysteria that this thinking sparked is known as McCarthyism and is named after
Joseph McCarthy, a senator from Wisconsin who was particularly vocal about the supposed
threat of communism. McCarthy accused many liberal people of nefarious dealings, but his
popularity began to decrease in the 1950s after it became clear that many of his frenzied
accusations were unfounded. Many activists striving for equality and racial justice were
accused of being communists, and though this was certainly true in some cases, the
accusations were mainly used as a quick and easy way to discredit certain activists in the eyes
of the general public, since many Americans subscribed to the notion that members of the
Communist Party were inherently dangerous. Godfrey Crumb shares this viewpoint in
Crumbs from the Table of Joy, but this might seem somewhat ironic, since his beloved Peace
Mission

Movement was actually aligned with the Communist Party in the 1930s. However, Father
Divine (who claimed to be God and led the Peace Mission Movement, a religious movement
with all the trappings of a cult) renounced the Communist Party during the Second Red Scare.
In doing so, he ended up contradicting many values that he had previously put at the center of
the Peace Mission Movement.
RELATED LITERARY WORKS

Because Crumbs from the Table of Joy features a Black family that migrates from Florida to
New York City, it’s worth considering it alongside one of Lynn Nottage’s other well- known
plays, Intimate ApparIntimate Apparelel, which is about a young Black woman who makes
her way to New York City in search of success. To that end, the famous playwright August
Wilson also wrote extensively about Black characters who traveled north looking for better
lives in the 20th century. In particular, Wilson’s plays Gem of the OceanGem of the Ocean
and Joe TJoe Turner’s Come and Goneurner’s Come and Gone examine the experience of
leaving the South to escape racism and look for new opportunities. In the same vein, Ralph
Ellison’s novel InInvisible Manvisible Man features a Black man who leaves the South for
New York City, where he—much like the members of the Crumb family—encounters the
Communist Party. Similarly, Richard Wright’s memoir, Black BoyBlack Boy, details the
author’s move to a northern city and his increasing involvement in the Communist Party.
KEY FACTS

 Full Title: Crumbs from the Table of Joy

 When Published: 1995
 Literary Period: Contemporary
 Genre: Drama
 Setting: 1950s Brooklyn
 Climax: Godfrey rushes into his apartment with blood on his face after a gang of
racists attacked him for being in an interracial marriage with Gerte.
 Antagonist: Racism and narrow-mindedness
EXTRA CREDIT

In Decline. As of 2015, there were only 19 known members of the Peace Mission Movement
(formerly led by Father Divine), which forbids its members from engaging in sexual
intercourse.

Terminator. The premiere of Crumbs from the Table of Joy was directed by Joe Morton, an
actor who has appeared in many famous films, including Terminator 2: Judgment Day.

INTRINTRODUCTIONODUCTION
Seventeen-year-old Ernestine Crumb addresses the audience and explains that grief laid her
family flat. When her mother died, her father, Godfrey, was unable to do anything but mourn
his wife—until he discovered the teachings of Father Divine, the leader of the Peace Mission
Movement. Wanting to be closer to Father Divine (who claims he’s God), Godfrey moved his
daughters—Ernestine and her sister, Ermina—to Brooklyn, only to discover that Father
Divine had relocated to Philadelphia.

Now the Crumbs live in a small apartment in a mostly Jewish neighborhood, where Godfrey
works in a bakery. Godfrey keeps a protective watch over Ernestine and Ermina (who’s 15),
especially trying to impress on them the importance of celibacy, which is one of Father
Divine’s most important teachings. He also doesn’t let them listen to the radio on Sunday. On
other days, the sisters go to the movies, which helps them grieve the loss of their mother,
since they feel like they can openly cry in the theaters while watching dramatic storylines
unfold before them. Other than going to the movies, Ernestine doesn’t do much, instead
focusing on her studies. Ermina, on the other hand, is eager to spend time with boys her own
age, but she rarely has the chance to do so.

One day, Godfrey eagerly awaits the mail, hoping he’ll receive a letter from Father Divine,
whom he has written to many times. When the mail finally comes, Ermina flips through it
and is excited to find a sample of fabric that she and her sister ordered. Ernestine will use the
fabric to make herself a graduation dress, the sisters explain to Godfrey, who’s astounded to
hear that his daughter will be graduating. She will be the first person in the family to finish
high school, so Godfrey is incredibly proud. When he asks why she didn’t tell him before,
though, she hints that she did, and he embarrassedly jots something down in his notepad—
something he does frequently throughout the play, explaining at one point that he’s writing
down questions to ask Father Divine when he finally sees him at the Holy Communion
Banquet later that year. After writing in his notepad, Godfrey is elated to discover that he has
received a response from Father Divine, in which Divine urges him to be strong in the face of
hardship and gives Godfrey and his daughters new names. Godfrey will be Godfrey
Goodness, Ernestine will be Darling Angel, and Ermina will be Devout Mary—a name she
hates.

Around this time, a woman comes to the apartment and introduces herself as Ernestine and
Ermina’s aunt. Her name is Lily, and she’s dressed in a style Ernestine has never seen a
Black woman wear—that is, she’s dressed like a stylish white woman. She explains that she
buys her clothes from the same stores where white women shop, suggesting to her niece that
that looking better than white women is a good way to stand up against racism and
discrimination. When Godfrey enters the

room and sees Lily, he seems taken aback and hesitant to welcome her, though he later
admits that he tried to find her in Harlem when he first arrived in New York City. It soon
becomes clear that Lily intends to stay with Godfrey and his daughters. She expresses her
regret that she was unable to be present for her sister’s death, but she claims that she
promised her mother—Ernestine and Ermina’s grandmother—that she would come look after
Godfrey’s daughters now that her sister is gone. Godfrey doesn’t seem happy about this,
particularly when Lily pokes fun of him for becoming so devoutly religious. She, for her part,
likes to drink alcohol, listen to jazz, and go dancing. When Godfrey tells her that he doesn’t
allow alcohol in the house, she tries to reminisce with him about their past, insinuating that
they used to get drunk in bars together and become romantic with each other. But Godfrey
awkwardly avoids the conversation. In the ensuing weeks, Ernestine starts sewing her
graduation dress. She often works on the dress while talking to Lily, who talks about an
imminent cultural revolution. She is a member of the Communist Party, but she mainly
speaks broadly about equality, raising points that resonate with Ernestine, who decides to
write a school essay about the labor movement. Her teacher is not happy with the result,
eventually showing it to the principal, who calls Godfrey in and lectures him about teaching
his daughter communist ideas. Godfrey is incensed. Because of Lily, he says, everybody
thinks he’s a communist now—even his coworkers, who won’t talk to him anymore. Lily,
however, claims that she didn’t teach Ernestine anything. Ernestine is just starting to think
critically about the world, she says. Meanwhile, the Holy Communion Banquet is fast
approaching. One morning, the Crumbs prepare to go to the Peace Mission building to make
sure everything is in order for Father Divine’s upcoming visit. Lily, however, won’t be going
the Peace Mission. She’s too hungover from the night before, having been out all night
dancing with an attractive Cuban man. As Ernestine and Ermina get ready to leave for the
Peace Mission, she tells them about her night, grabbing Ernestine and showing her how to do
the mambo. Soon enough, though, Godfrey comes in and puts an end to their fun. When he
tries to shame her for drinking, she laughs him off and starts talking about how he used to
like to feel her thigh when he was drunk. As they argue, Godfrey desperately tries to send his
daughters out of the room. Soon enough, Lily asks if he wants her to apologize, saying that
she’d oblige this wish if that’s what he wants. She then kisses him, and though he eventually
pulls away, he can’t help but give in for a moment before cutting it off. After pulling away,
he tells Lily that if she’s going to live with them, she needs to respect his rules. Before he
started following Father Divine, the only thing he could do to handle his grief was drink. But
finding the Peace Mission Movement helped him change. Still, he finds great temptation in
Lily’s presence. As he explains this temptation, he

PLPLOOT SUMMARYT SUMMARY

will be the first person in the family to finish high school. As time passes, Ernestine grows
closer to her aunt, Lily, who arrives unannounced one day and moves in with the family.
Much to her father’s dismay, Ernestine is moved—albeit somewhat confused—by Lily’s
revolutionary and communist ideas. In particular, Lily’s progressive ideas about racism and
sexism in the United States resonate with Ernestine, who eventually follows her aunt’s advice
to stand up against prejudice and discrimination by making herself “essential,” eventually
going to college and becoming an activist in the civil rights movement.

GodfreGodfrey Crumpy Crump – Godfrey Crumb is Black man who has recently moved
from Florida to Brooklyn with his daughters, Ernestine and Ermina. Godfrey was inspired to
travel north after his wife’s death, which sent him into a spiral of grief. The implication is
that Godfrey turned to alcohol after his wife’s death, but then he came into contact with the
teachings of Father Divine, a (real-life) religious leader. Inspired by Father Divine’s message
of love, peace, and faith, Godfrey stopped drinking and moved to New York, thinking that’s
where Father Divine’s movement (the Peace Mission Movement) was situated. It was only
after arriving in New York that Godfrey learned Father Divine had moved to Philadelphia,
but he decided to stay, taking a job in a bakery. He, Ernestine, and Ermina now live in a small
apartment in a mostly Jewish neighborhood. Godfrey seldom lets his daughters out of the
apartment, worrying that the outside world is full of evil and danger. He spends most of his
time thinking about questions he wants to ask Father Divine when he finally meets him in
person. Whenever a difficult topic comes up, he takes out a notepad and writes something
down, explaining at one point that he’s keeping track of the many questions he wants to pose
to Father Divine. When he marries a German woman named Gerte, he effectively follows
Father Divine’s example by marrying a white woman but refraining from sexually
consummating the marriage. The marriage upsets Godfrey’s daughters, but it especially
rankles Godfrey’s former sister-in-law, Lily, with whom Godfrey seems to have a romantic
history. But Godfrey ends up standing by Gerte, prompting Lily to disappear from his life.

LilyLily – Lily is Ernestine and Ermina’s aunt and Godfrey’s late wife’s sister. An
independent, progressive Black woman involved with the Communist Party, she arrives
unannounced at the Crumbs’ apartment in Brooklyn not long after they’ve arrived in the city.
Godfrey is surprised to see her, and though he reluctantly welcomes her and lets her stay, he’s
uptight and nervous around her, largely because he feels tempted by her presence. The
implication is that they have some sort of romantic history, as Lily often makes subtle
remarks about the times they used to spend together in bars in the South. What’s more,
Godfrey no longer approves of drinking and makes a point of not keeping alcohol in the
house, but Lily frequently

stays out late and comes home drunk. She also talks to Ernestine about the idea of equality,
urging her to think critically about the race and gender dynamics that directly impact her life
—ideas Godfrey doesn’t want Lily talking about, fearing that his family will be associated
with communism. Lily, for her part, often talks about how influential she is in certain
intellectual circles, but it’s never quite clear whether or not this is truly the case. For the most
part, she spends her time partying, especially after Godfrey brings home his new white wife,
Gerte—a move that deeply vexes Lily, who seems to have thought she and Godfrey might
eventually get together. In the end, Godfrey asks Lily to leave the apartment, and they don’t
hear from her again. Years later, Ermina is the one to officially identify Lily’s corpse, which
is “poked full of holes,” suggesting that she succumbed to an intravenous drug addiction. And
yet, her legacy lives on through Ernestine, whose work as an activist is the result of her aunt’s
initial teachings. Ermina CrumpErmina Crump – Ermina is Ernestine’s younger sister, a 15-
year-old Black girl who has just moved to Brooklyn from Florida. Unlike Ernestine, who is
relatively shy and reserved, Ermina is extroverted and eager to meet boys her own age—
something that her father, Godfrey, strictly forbids, since his newfound religious views
champion the idea of chastity. When Ernestine and Ermina find a beautiful lace sample in a
department store, Ermina steals it so that her older sister can sew it onto her graduation dress,
since their late mother wanted her to have a beautiful gown for the occasion. Ermina ends up
getting pregnant at a relatively young age, when Ernestine is still in college, ultimately
suggesting that her father’s overprotective ways did nothing to prevent her from pursuing
romantic affection. Ermina is also the one who officially identifies Lily’s dead body years
later while visiting her grandmother in the South. GerteGerte – Gerte is a white woman from
Germany who meets Godfrey on the New York City subway. When they happen to meet,
Godfrey is in the midst of feeling overwhelmed by his conflicting desires to embrace Lily’s
affection and stay true to his religious beliefs. Gerte, for her part, has just arrived in the
United States and asks for Godfrey’s help navigating the subway system, asking if New
Orleans if far away—a good indication that she’s quite unfamiliar with the country, which
she later reveals she has idealized after learning to love American jazz. Gerte and Godfrey
end up getting hastily married, which doesn’t go over well in the Crump family. Both
Ernestine and Ermina can’t believe their father would not only remarry less than a year after
the death of their mother but also marry a white woman. Lily is also shocked by this
development, apparently having thought she and Godfrey might eventually rekindle their
romantic feelings for each other. Gerte, however, finds it difficult to understand why it
matters if a Black man marries a white woman, revealing a certain inability to grasp the tense
and complex dynamics
surrounding race relations in the United States. When racists attack Godfrey for being with a
white woman, she is more shocked than anyone in the family, once again failing to recognize
the ugly reality of American racism. She has a tense relationship with everyone in the Crump
family, but Godfrey stands by her, eventually asking Lily to leave in order to protect his
marriage to Gerte.

Father DivineFather Divine – Father Divine was the leader and founder of the Peace Mission
Movement, a real-life religious movement that reached its prominence in the mid-20th
century. Father Divine claimed that he was God and sang the virtues of celibacy, which is
partially why the Peace Mission Movement only had 19 remaining members as of 2015
(since its members can’t procreate). While the movement was—by most measures—a cult,
it’s worth noting that Father Divine was a strong advocate for the civil rights movement and
structured his teachings around the idea of racial equality. It’s somewhat ironic, then, that
Godfrey doesn’t want Lily to teach his daughters her progressive and communist ideas about
equality, considering that Godfrey himself covets the teachings of the Peace Mission
Movement, which was officially aligned with the Communist Party at one point and was so
concerned with issues of racial equality.

In LitCharts literature guides, each theme gets its own color- coded icon. These icons make it
easy to track where the themes occur most prominently throughout the work. If you don't
have a color printer, you can still use the icons to track themes in black and white.
FAITH, DEVOTION, AND HOPE

Crumbs From the Table of Joy is a play that explores the impact a strong sense of faith can
have on a person’s life. For Ernestine Crumb’s father, Godfrey, religious faith is what helps
him feel centered and grounded in the face of sadness and uncertainty. In the aftermath of his
wife’s death, he devotes himself to the Peace Mission Movement (a real-life movement led
by a Black man named Father Divine, who claimed to be God). Throughout the play, Godfrey
writes down questions he wants to ask Father Divine when he finally sees him, illustrating the
extent to which he has allowed religion and the Peace Mission Movement to inform his life—
so much, it seems, that he is hesitant to think for himself, instead wanting constant guidance.
In contrast, his dead wife’s sister, Lily, is highly critical of organized religion, instead
aligning herself with the Communist Party and filtering her thoughts through a communist
lens—thoughts that she shares with Ernestine.

Although Lily and Godfrey are highly critical of each other’s

beliefs, the faith they place in their respective worldviews are actually quite similar, since
they both invest themselves in ideas and organizations that give their lives a sense of purpose.
Simply put, both characters believe in the importance of things that are bigger than
themselves. The play thus explores the human impulse to find meaning and hope in belief
systems or institutions that help make sense of the world. It effectively dramatizes this
impulse by highlighting Ernestine’s gradual gravitation away from her father’s religion and
toward her aunt’s political activism.
RACISM AND OPPORTUNITY

Crumbs From the Table of Joy deals directly with the harsh reality of racism in the United
States and the seemingly ever-present threat it poses to Black Americans. Set in the 1950s,
the play spotlights the Crumb family’s attempt to escape the injustices of the Jim Crow
(racial segregation) laws by traveling from the South to New York City. And yet, the play
suggests that escaping racism isn’t as easy as simply leaving the South, as Godfrey and his
daughters Ernestine and Ermina still face bigotry and prejudice in the North—an indication
that hatred and bigotry are unfortunately pervasive throughout the country. It is precisely
because of this pervasiveness that Ernestine and Ermina’s aunt Lily wants to teach the girls
about the need for a cultural “revolution,” trying to show them that they should strive for
power and a sense of independence, which Lily implies is the only way Black Americans will
be able to push back against the racist power structures that have historically oppressed and
disenfranchised them. Lily tells Ernestine that she should find a job that will make her
“essential,” since this will make it more difficult for people to discriminate against her.
According to Lily, it’s important for young Black women like Ernestine to actively seek out
opportunity, success, and power instead of passively letting life “happen” to them. Change, in
other words, isn’t just going to come about on its own. Ernestine seems to come to this
conclusion for herself after her father is attacked by racists for having married Gerte, who’s
white. Although Godfrey and Gerte clearly want to believe they live in a society in which
interracial marriages don’t attract hatred and violence, Ernestine sees once and for all that this
isn’t the case. The play therefore advocates for pragmatically recognizing the unfortunate
reality of racism and then working to counteract it—which is what Ernestine does by
pursuing an education and becoming a civil rights activist.
GRIEF, LOSS, AND MOVING ON

Crumbs From the Table of Joy follows the Crump family’s mourning process, as each family
member struggles to move on from the death of Ernestine and Ermina’s mother. The play
presents the loss of a loved one as something capable of completely halting and even
derailing a

THEMESTHEMES

might seem harmless, but it soon becomes clear that Godfrey uses this habit to run from his
problems. By writing in his notepad, he delays the actual act of dealing with whatever has
just come up, effectively putting himself at ease with the idea that Father Divine will
eventually answer all his questions. In this way, Godfrey doesn’t actually have to deal with
anything himself. But when Father Divine fails to show up at the Holy Communion Banquet,
Godfrey feels lost because he realizes he still has all of these unanswered questions. He even
says that he needs Father Divine’s answers in order to “move on,” making it quite clear that
he has devoted himself to the Peace Mission Movement as a way of coping with the loss of
his wife—a loss from which he hasn’t yet managed to “move on,” since he hasn’t actually
been doing anything other than investing himself in the idea that somebody else will help him
put his life back together. The notepad thus represents the dangers of investing too much faith
in any single person or belief, since doing so can take away the motivation to address certain
challenges on one’s own.

Note: all page numbers for the quotes below refer to the Theatre Communications Group
edition of Crumbs from the Table of Joy and Other Plays published in 2003.

Prologue Quotes

Death nearly crippled my father slipping beneath the soles of his feet and taking away his
ability to walk at will. Death made him wail like a god awful banshee. (Godfrey wails like a
god awful banshee.) Like the 12:01 steam boat mooring. (Godfrey continues to wail.) Death
made strangers take hold of our hands and recount endless stories of mommy. In church, at
work, strolling, laughing, eating [...]. Death made us nauseous with regret. It clipped daddy’s
tongue and put his temper to rest. Made folks shuffle and bow their heads. But it wouldn’t
leave us be, tugging at our stomachs and our throats. And then one day it stopped and we
took the train north to New York City.

Related Characters: Ernestine Crump (speaker), Ermina Crump, Godfrey Crump

Related Themes:

Page Number: 5

Explanation and Analysis The play opens with Ernestine Crumb directly addressing the
audience and describing how the grief of losing her mother impacted her family. Her
mother’s death took an especially terrible toll on her father, Godfrey, who

seemingly lost his willpower to do anything in life—including stand or “walk at will.” More
importantly, Ernestine explains that the sadness surrounding her mother’s death was basically
ever-present, describing it as something that was constantly “tugging at [their] stomachs and
[their] throats.” In other words, grief saturated every aspect of their lives, often seeming to
reside within their very own bodies, almost as if it were a physical ailment. And yet,
Ernestine also says, “And then one day it stopped and we took the train north to New York
City.” This sets the stage for the rest of the play, which takes place after the Crumb family
has moved. Although Ernestine says that the family’s grief suddenly “stopped,” it’s
reasonable to assume this isn’t actually the case—after all, the sadness was so pervasive in
their lives that it’s unlikely it would simply disappear. The implication, then, is that this is
what Godfrey wants his family to think: he wants them to believe that they’ve healed and
moved on from their terrible loss, but the play goes on to show that this is an unrealistic
expectation. To that end, the rest of the play will challenge the idea that Godfrey’s newfound
coping mechanisms (including his religious devotion) have actually helped him move on
from losing his wife.

Father Divine.... Ever since Mommy passed on, he stands between us and our enjoyment.
Daddy discovered Father Divine when he was searching to cure “the ailments of the heart,”
those terrible fits of mourning that set in. (Godfrey begins to weep, loudly.) Father Divine,
the great provider, sent his blessing via mail. And shortly there after Daddy was cured.

Related Characters: Ernestine Crump (speaker), Father Divine, Godfrey Crump

Related Themes:

Page Number: 8

Explanation and Analysis Speaking directly to the audience, Ernestine explains how her
father’s devotion to Father Divine and the Peace Mission Movement has impacted the family
as a whole. Father Divine was a real-life figure who founded the Peace Mission Movement
and claimed to be God. Such a powerful message seems to have spoken directly to Godfrey,
who at the time was struggling with “ailments of the heart.” In other words, Godfrey felt
heartsick and lost after his wife died, so he was especially susceptible to the teachings of
charismatic leaders like Father Divine. For Ernestine and

QUOQUOTESTES

her younger sister, Ermina, though, Father Divine’s teachings don’t bring much emotional
relief. To the contrary, the Peace Mission Movement’s merciless rules and restrictive
worldviews seem quite stifling, which is why Ernestine says that Father Divine is always
getting in the way of her ability to “enjoy[]” life. For Godfrey, Father Divine’s teachings act
as a soothing balm that helps him address his grief. For his daughters, though, these teachings
seem a lot less profound. When Ernestine says that her father was “cured” shortly after
receiving a blessing in the mail from Father Divine, it’s implied that she doesn’t actually
believe this, ultimately underscoring how unrealistic it is for her father to think he can move
on from his grief so quickly and easily.

ERNESTINE. [...] Divine was God, and God was liable do as he pleased, but you see Daddy
was just a poor colored man — (Godfrey looks up from his newspaper.)

GODFREY. (With Ernestine.) from Pensacola, and I gone out my way to keep trouble a few
arms lengths ’way. I don’ want to wind up like them Scottsboro boys, but you wouldn’t
remember. (Godfrey speaks, Ernestine mouths the words:) Terrible mess, terrible mess.

Related Characters: Ernestine Crump, Godfrey Crump (speaker), Father Divine, Ermina
Crump

Related Themes:

Page Number: 9

Explanation and Analysis As Ernestine speaks to the audience and narrates her father’s
personal history, she talks about Godfrey’s tendency to keep his distance from white people.
Even though the white couple living above the Crumps in Brooklyn are kind to Ernestine and
Ermina, Godfrey doesn’t want his daughters going upstairs to visit them, reminding the girls
that their neighbors are white. Ernestine, for her part, knows that Father Divine—whom
Godfrey worships—married a white woman, but she points out that Father Divine claims to
be God and that, because of this, Godfrey doesn’t question his decisions. As Ernestine
continues to talk about her father, Godfrey himself jumps in and takes over, explaining that
he’s from Pensacola, Florida, and that he has always tried to “keep trouble a few arms
lengths” away. And he has done this, he implies, by avoiding white people as much as
possible, since he knows all too well how dangerous it can be as a Black man to interact with

white people. To illustrate this danger, he references the Scottsboro Boys, a group of nine
Black teenagers who were wrongfully accused of raping a white woman in Alabama in the
1930s. The Scottsboro Boys were imprisoned and many of them were even sentenced to
death row, though their sentences were later commuted and none of them died by execution.
Still, their lives were completely upended—and arguably ruined—by the entire ordeal.
Godfrey’s reference to the Scottsboro Boys thus illustrates just how aware he is of what racist
white people are capable of doing to Black people.

Act 1, Scene 1 Quotes

GODFREY. You graduating? (Ernestine nods. Godfrey breaks into a smile.) Nah.... A first.
You really gonna graduate? You’re gonna be a high school graduate like Percy Duncan,
Roberta Miles, Sarah Dickerson, Elmore Sinclair, Chappy Phillips and Ernestine Clump.
(Ernestine bashful covers her face.) ERNESTINE. Not quite yet! GODFREY. Why didn’t
you say something? ERNESTINE. Didn’t I? (A moment. Godfrey embarrassed takes out his
note pad.) GODFREY. ... The New Day come?

Related Characters: Godfrey Crump, Ernestine Crump (speaker), Ermina Crump, Father
Divine

Related Themes:

Related Symbols:

Page Number: 13

Explanation and Analysis When Ermina goes through the mail one day and excitedly tells
Ernestine that she finally received a sample of fabric they ordered for her graduation dress,
Godfrey is astounded to learn that his eldest daughter will soon be graduating high school.
Proud and impressed, he talks about how Ernestine will be the first person in the Crumb
family to earn a high school diploma, listing off a handful of people he knows who have
made this achievement. The fact that Godfrey lists these names suggests that he respects
these people; it also subtly hints that he doesn’t actually know very many people who have
graduated high school, which is why he can remember these names off the top of his head.

Explanation and Analysis When Godfrey asks Lily if she’s still involved in the Communist
Party, he hesitates to actually say “Communist Party,” prompting Lily to make fun of him for
acting like it’s dangerous to even talk about communism. After she says this, though, Ermina
nervously laughs, perhaps because she knows her father disapproves of the Communist Party
so adamantly. In turn, Lily becomes quite serious and talks about how there’s nothing funny
about advocating for justice, equality, and labor rights. She points out that Black people like
the Crumps have very little to be thankful for, since they are still quite disenfranchised and
don’t have many resources available to them. Although Godfrey might feel like he’s able to
support his family because he has a stable job, Lily emphasizes the fact that he’s still living in
a basement apartment. For her, then, getting involved with the Communist Party is a way to
push back against racial inequality in the United States. Needless to say, there’s nothing
sinister about striving for equality, but Lily acknowledges that Americans have villainized the
Communist Party, which is what she means when she talks about Red Scare. Given that the
Communist Party promotes equality and racial justice, she argues, the widespread resistance
to the Party itself is—in many ways—yet another form of racism, as powerful white people
fear the ways in which the Communist Party might empower Black people.

Act 1, Scene 3 Quotes

ERMINA. Why’d you lose your job?

LILY. Well babies, a Negro woman with my gumption don’t keep work so easily. It’s one of
the hazards of being an independent thinker.

Related Characters: Ermina Crump, Lily (speaker), Ernestine Crump

Related Themes:

Page Number: 22

Explanation and Analysis After Lily has been living with the Crumps for a little while, she
tells her nieces that she has lost her job as an etymologist (someone who studies words’
origins and meanings). It’s worth noting that she never said much about this job in the first
place—when her nieces wanted to know what, exactly, an etymologist does, Lily quickly
changed the

subject, claiming that she didn’t want to bore them. This is a possible sign that she didn’t
actually have a job as an etymologist, though this reading runs the risk of undermining her
professional abilities in the same way that racists might try to undercut her accomplishments.
Either way, the thing that matters most in the play is what Lily says in this scene, as she tells
Ernestine and Ermina that Black women with “gumption don’t keep work so easily.” What
she means is that Black women who are “independent thinker[s]” are often discriminated
against in the workplace (and beyond), since American society tends to favor disenfranchised
people who are willing to unquestioningly go along with their own disempowerment. To
stand up against injustice, though, is to invite all kinds of scorn.

Nobody ask me.... Besides I never plan to marry. How you like that? I’m exerting my own
will, and since the only thing ever willed for me was marriage, I choose not to do it. And why
take just one man, when you can have a lifetime full of so many. Listen up, that may be the
best advice I give you babies. And you needn’t share that little pearl of wisdom with your
daddy.

Related Characters: Lily (speaker), Ernestine Crump, Ermina Crump, Godfrey Crump

Related Themes:

Page Number: 23

Explanation and Analysis Lily spends time with Ernestine and Ermina while doing their hair
in the kitchen. As she works on Ermina’s hair, the sisters ask Lily why she has never been
married, and she tells them that nobody has ever proposed to her. This, however, isn’t
necessarily the only reason she’s single—rather, it’s because she doesn’t “plan to marry” at
all. Lily recognizes that this sentiment is, in and of itself, rather transgressive in the context of
1950s American society, which is why she slyly says, “How you like that?” She can tell that
Ernestine and Ermina have never even considered the possibility that they don’t have to get
married, especially since their father is so adamant about upholding strict religious values. In
fact, although Godfrey believes that his daughters should remain virgins for their entire lives,
he almost certainly still wants them to get married. His viewpoint, then, starkly juxtaposes
Lily’s worldview, in which remaining single opens the door for a woman to enjoy many
lovers throughout her entire life. This scene thus spotlights the extent to which Lily’s
progressive views clash

with Godfrey’s conservative views, ultimately showing Ernestine and Ermina that their
father’s restrictive outlook isn’t the only way to live.
[...] I wondered had her revolution already begun? So I went down to the Public library round
my way, “Revolution, American, Revolutionary War, Revolution, French.” But no Negro
Revolution. I did find twenty entries on communism in the card catalogue, but no books on
the shelves. The teacher said, “select a topic that’s close to you.” My essay was entitled “The
Colored Worker in the United States,” the mistake was using the word “worker” too liberally.
The principal called in Daddy Goodness and told him to stop mingling with the Jews at his
job and everything would be all right. Daddy didn’t bother to tell him that his co-workers
were all colored. And the Jews on our block won’t speak to us.

Related Characters: Ernestine Crump (speaker), Lily, Godfrey Crump

Related Themes:

Page Number: 25

Explanation and Analysis Speaking directly to the audience once again, Ernestine explains
how Lily’s talk about an imminent cultural revolution in the United States inspires her to seek
out information about communism and the idea of a revolution in general. Her limited
knowledge in this realm leads her to interpret Lily’s words about a coming revolution a bit
too literally, assuming that the social change her aunt is referring to has already materialized
into a fully formed, cohesive movement. Of course, this isn’t the case, so it’s no wonder that
she’s unable to find anything in the library about the “Negro Revolution” her aunt talks so
much about. She does, however, find plenty of literature about communism and the labor
movement in the United States. She ends up writing an essay about the labor movement
(which advocated for workers’ rights), and though she doesn’t intend to espouse communist
ideas, her teacher and principal overlook her actual points and assume she has been learning
about communism through her father and his experience working with Jewish people. (As a
side note, it was quite common for anti-communist Americans to make the anti-Semitic
assumption that Jewish people were communists who posed a threat to American society in
the mid-20th century; this is why the principal tells Daddy to “stop mingling” with Jewish
people at work.) This entire

story illustrates just how close-minded many Americans were at the time, constantly vilifying
any sort of critical thinking about the power structures at play in society.

Well hell Godfrey I ain’t said nothing about nothing. I can’t help it if that child got eyes and
ears, and a mind that ain’t limited to a few pages in the bible.

Related Characters: Lily (speaker), Godfrey Crump, Ernestine Crump

Related Themes:

Page Number: 25

Explanation and Analysis After Ernestine gets in trouble at school for writing an essay about
the labor movement, Godfrey is very angry and embarrassed. He explains to Lily that
everybody thinks he’s a communist now, since the school principal accused him of teaching
his daughter communist ideas. Godfrey, for his part, blames Lily for filling Ernestine’s head
with such ideas. In response, Lily insists that she hasn’t been teaching Ernestine about
communism, saying that it’s not her fault that Ernestine has “eyes and ears, and a mind that
ain’t limited to a few pages in the bible.” By saying this, Lily does two things. First, she
celebrates Ernestine’s ability to have thoughts of her own, implying that she shouldn’t be
punished simply for thinking critically about the world around her. And by saying this, Lily
also ends up challenging Godfrey’s limited worldview, suggesting that Godfrey funnels
everything in his life through his religious beliefs. In fact, she further implies that Godfrey’s
perspective is so narrow-minded that he doesn’t even make use of the entire Bible, instead
restricting himself to “a few pages.” The idea here is that Godfrey has latched onto a select
few religious ideas to help him get by in the world. And though that might work fine for
Godfrey, Lily tries to help him see that Ernestine deserves to branch out in her thinking if
that’s what she wants to do.

Related Characters: Godfrey Crump (speaker), Father Divine

Related Themes:

Related Symbols:

Page Number: 40-

Explanation and Analysis Godfrey spends the first half of the play looking forward to
meeting Father Divine at the Holy Communion Banquet, where he plans to ask Divine the
many questions he has written down in his notepad. However, Father Divine never ends up
coming to the banquet, as he supposedly gets a flat tire in New Jersey. As everyone clears the
food off the table, Godfrey has trouble accepting that Father Divine won’t be coming,
lamenting that he still has so many questions he needs to ask him. “I need him to help me
move on,” he says, ultimately emphasizing the extent to which he sees his devotion to Father
Divine and the Peace Mission Movement as a way of overcoming his grief about his late wife
and “mov[ing] on” with his life. In turn, the questions he has been writing throughout the
play take on a new significance, symbolizing the dangers of relying too much on other people
to provide guidance. The questions themselves remain unanswered, and this represents how
lost Godfrey feels without someone to give meaning and substance to his life.

Act 2, Scene 2 Quotes

LILY. [..] What? I don’t generally do this, but I’ve been nervous as of late.

GERTE. (Sarcastically.) Just how is your ... “revolution?” Working hard? You’re spending a
lot of time up at the headquarters in Harlem. Where is it exactly?

LILY. Lenox Avenue.

GERTE. That’s right, Lenox Avenue. I haven’t heard you mention it in quite some time.
(Lily stands.)

ERNESTINE. Yeah, you ain’t said much.

LILY. ’Cause it’s liable to end up in one of your essays. You got too much imagination to
keep a simple secret.

Related Characters: Lily, Gerte, Ernestine Crump (speaker)

Related Themes:

Page Number: 47

Explanation and Analysis While verbally sparring with Gerte, Lily pours herself a glass of
whiskey and claims that she needs it because she has been “nervous as of late.” Gerte jumps
on this opportunity to patronizingly talk about the “hard” work Lily has supposedly been
doing for the Communist Party. By this point in the play, it’s pretty clear that Lily has
become a lot less involved in social activism as she’d like others to think, most likely because
she spends most of her time drinking. Even Ernestine, who generally sides with Lily over
Gerte, admits that Lily hasn’t been talking much about communism and the impending
revolution she usually talks so much about. It makes sense that Ernestine would notice this
change, since Ernestine herself has gradually developed an interest in her aunt’s ideas. In this
moment, then, the play subtly hints that Lily is in something of a downward spiral, ultimately
losing touch with the things that matter most to her as she starts to drink more and more.
There’s also a certain contrast at play here, since Ernestine is just beginning to become
socially conscious even as her aunt’s political engagement is waning. In turn, Ernestine
perhaps begins to intuit that life can be hard for people who go against mainstream belief and
stand up for themselves—a challenge that Lily doesn’t seem to be responding very well to.

GERTE. Can’t you forget our differences behind this closed door. When I see you I see no
color. I see Lily. (She lights a cigarette.) LILY. Well when I see ya I see a white woman, and
when I look in the mirror I see a Negro woman. All that in the confines in this here room.
How about that? What do you see Ernie? You see any differences between us? ERNESTINE.
Yeah. LILY. There you go. GERTE. May I say to you both, I have seen what happens when
we permit our differences— LILY. (Enraged.) Don’t lecture me about race. You are the last
person on earth I’d look to for guidance.

Related Characters: Gerte, Lily, Ernestine Crump (speaker)

Related Themes:

Page Number: 48

Explanation and Analysis

In an argument between Gerte and Lily, Gerte accuses Lily of always twisting her words
around to make her sound racist. She then essentially insists that she doesn’t see race, saying,
“When I see you I see no color. I see Lily.” As Lily makes clear, this isn’t the progressive,
open-minded sentiment Gerte thinks it is—rather, it’s a problematic and naïve viewpoint that
only someone who has never experienced racism firsthand (that is, a white person) could
possibly set forth. Lily tries to get Gerte to see that race is a very real thing and that ignoring
the color of one’s own skin isn’t something a Black person can do, since the constant hatred
and injustice that Black people experience is an ugly, ever-present reminder of how society
discriminates based on race. Gerte, for her part, tries to respond by making a comparison
between racism in the United States and the persecution of Jewish people by Nazis during the
Holocaust, but Lily cuts her off. This is a ridiculous comparison to make, since it’s not as if
Black Americans are the ones “permit[ing their] differences” with white people to come
between them; rather, Black people are forced to deal daily with the horrible history of racism
in the United States. And there’s no point, Lily implies, in pretending that this history doesn’t
exist. This exchange thus underscores Gerte’s failure to fully recognize the difficult position
Black people occupy in the United States and her problematic impulse to downplay the
hardships Black people continue to face.

LILY. [...] You expecting too much from that blanched mess of fabric. What’s it gonna get
you?

ERNESTINE. I’m gonna graduate in it. I’ll be grown.

LILY. Grown. You think ’cause you got a diploma you grown. You’ll be ready to step out
that door in your white dress and get a job or a husband.

Related Characters: Lily, Ernestine Crump (speaker), Gerte

Related Themes:

Related Symbols:

Page Number: 52

Explanation and Analysis After Lily gets into a long argument with Gerte, she sits on the
couch and drinks, eventually taking her anger out on Ernestine. More specifically, Lily has
just heard that Gerte likes the lace that Ernestine has sewn onto her graduation dress, and
because Lily is eager to go against anything Gerte

says, she ends up insulting the dress itself. In particular, she suggests that it doesn’t matter
what the dress looks like, since a dress won’t do anything to make Ernestine into the person
she wants to be—she won’t, Lily says, suddenly be an adult just because she’s wearing a nice
dress, nor will she be an adult because she has a high school diploma. Everything she says in
this moment goes against the things she has already taught Ernestine. One of the first things
Lily told Ernestine, after all, was that dressing well can be “subversive” when it comes to
challenging society’s white power structures. She has also suggested that education is an
important way for Black women to gain power and influence that is generally unavailable to
them otherwise. In this moment, then, Lily lets her anger and pettiness get the better of her,
attacking her niece instead of supporting and uplifting her.

Act 2, Scene 3 Quotes

GERTE. So where are the warriors in your revolution now? Why don’t they help us? How
are we to lead our lives if we can’t go out for a ... a picture show on a Saturday night. LILY.
Welcome to our world, [...]. You ain’t supposed to period! Stop! Thought you knew about all
these things being from Germany and all.

Related Characters: Gerte, Lily (speaker), Godfrey Crump

Related Themes:

Page Number: 54
Explanation and Analysis After a group of racist white people physically assaults Godfrey for
being married to a white woman, he and Gerte rush into the apartment. Godfrey is bleeding
from the head and wants to go back outside to track down his attackers, but his family keeps
him from doing so. In the chaos, Gerte angrily turns to Lily and asks her where the “warriors
in [her] revolution” are now—that is, why the Communist Party hasn’t made more progress
in stamping out racism. This is a patronizing thing to ask, since Gerte’s tone clearly implies
that Lily’s activist efforts have all been for nothing. At the same time, though, Gerte also
expresses utter shock that such a thing could possibly happen. Her surprise once again sheds
light on her failure to truly grasp the harsh reality of racism in the United States, which is
why Lily fires back by welcoming her to the reality of life for Black people in American
society. Gerte wants to know how she and

The color-coded icons under each analysis entry make it easy to track where the themes occur
most prominently throughout the work. Each icon corresponds to one of the themes explained
in the Themes section of this LitChart.

PROLOGUE

Seventeen-year-old Ernestine Crump sits on a park bench in Brooklyn with her 15-year-old
sister, Ermina, and her father, Godfrey. Directly addressing the audience, she explains that
the grief of her mother’s death laid her father flat. Godfrey cries out in sorrow as Ernestine
explains how their family mourned her mother’s death. The loss especially changed how
Godfrey moved through the world, making him quiet and reserved. And then one day,
Godfrey simply stopped wailing with grief, packed the family up, and moved them from
Florida to Brooklyn.

From the very beginning of the play, it’s clear that Crumbs from the Table of Joy will explore
the difficulties of moving on from grief and loss. After Ernestine and Ermina’s mother died,
their family was weighed down by their grief—especially Godfrey, who was seemingly
incapable of doing anything at all. And when he finally did do something to move on from
this terrible loss, he made a rather drastic move by uprooting his family and relocating to
Brooklyn. It seems, then, that Godfrey’s response to hardship is somewhat desperate, as grief
has led him to completely change everything about his life.

Ernestine explains to the audience that her father got a job at a bakery in Brooklyn. He left
for work after dinner each night and came back in the early morning, nodding on his way in
and out to a hanged photograph of a man named Father Divine. While he was gone, Ernestine
and Ermina would go to school, where the other girls made fun of them for their southern
upbringing and the rural way they dressed. Ermina often fought the girls, furious because of
their remarks. But the two sisters found refuge in movie theaters, where they could go and
watch dramatic films while sitting right next to white viewers. They could weep at the
movies, and nobody would say anything.

The fact that Ernestine and Ermina seek refuge in movie theaters hints at a desire to escape
their own lives, as if watching a movie helps them see beyond their own bleak circumstances.
What’s more, the girls’ awareness of their proximity to white viewers in the theater highlights
the cultural shift they’ve experienced by migrating from the South to the North. Whereas
their home in the South was highly segregated, New York City is not. This takes some getting
used to, as they’re now tasked with learning all of the social codes and practices of the North,
where racism is less apparent but still very much alive.
It’s the 1950s, and everybody around Ernestine and Ermina is talking about the threat of
communism—except, that is, for their father, whose main concern is whether or not Father
Divine has written back to him. Godfrey has been writing to Father Divine, the leader of the
Peace Mission Movement. Godfrey turned to the teachings of Father Divine when he was in
the throes of sorrow after his wife’s death. Father Divine ended up blessing Godfrey via mail,
which suddenly “cured” Godfrey’s grief and made it possible for him to move on. Godfrey
was so grateful that he decided to move closer to Father Divine, which is why he took the
family to Brooklyn—only to discover that the Peace Mission Movement had relocated to
Philadelphia.

The Peace Mission Movement was an actual religious movement that reached its height in the
first half of the 20th century. Its leader was Father Divine, who claimed he was God and
taught his followers to abstain from sexual intercourse. Although the Peace Mission
Movement was essentially a cult, it’s worth pointing out some of Father Divine’s most
central teachings were about the importance of racial equality, ultimately aligning the group
with the civil rights movement and even—at one point in the 1930s—the Communist Party.
This is because the Peace Mission Movement actually practiced a form of “communal
socialism,” in which the community pooled its resources and shared the profits of various
movement-related businesses.

SUMMARY AND ANALSUMMARY AND ANALYSISYSIS

©2022 LitCharts LLC LitCharts Page 16

On a Sunday evening, Ernestine and Ermina want to listen to the radio, but Godfrey won’t let
them. He reminds them that it’s Sunday and that Father Divine wouldn’t approve, so they beg
to go upstairs to visit their neighbors, an elderly Jewish couple who often gives them money
on the weekends to turn on various appliances—like, for instance, the television. But Godfrey
doesn’t want his daughters spending so much time with white people. Ernestine finds this
hypocritical, since Father Divine himself married a “spotless white virgin.” Still, Godfrey
doesn’t want anything to do with white people, saying that he doesn’t want to end up like the
Scottsboro Boys.

The Scottsboro Boys were a group of nine Black teenagers who were falsely accused of
raping a white woman. The trials that followed this accusation were long and attracted quite a
bit of attention from the general public, and the entire event drastically altered each
defendant’s life. Although several of the teenagers eventually went on to lead rewarding lives
outside of prison, the entire ordeal largely ruined the defendants’ lives. The fact that Godfrey
references the Scottsboro Boys underscores just how frightened he is of the harsh reality of
racism in the United States—so frightened, it seems, that he doesn’t want to take any
chances, instead opting to avoid white people as much as possible. Even just helping Jewish
neighbors by turning on electrical appliances on the Sabbath (a day when many Jewish
people refrain from using modern technology) seems potentially sinister to a Black man
living under the constant threat of racist aggression.

ACT 1, SCENE 1

As Ermina sorts through the mail one day, Godfrey impatiently asks if Father Divine has
finally responded to him. But Ermina is more interested in a square of fabric that Ernestine
mail- ordered for a dress she’s making. It’s a dress for her high school graduation, and
Ermina notes that their mother had promised Ernestine a beautiful dress for the occasion.
Godfrey, for his part, is shocked to hear his daughters talk about this dress—he didn’t even
know Ernestine was going to graduate. He’s suddenly overcome by pride, talking about how
Ernestine will be the first person in the family to graduate high school. He also asks why
Ernestine didn’t mention this achievement, but she hints that she did. Embarrassed, Godfrey
takes out a small notepad and writes something down.

That Godfrey didn’t already know his daughter would soon be graduating high school is a
good illustration of how wrapped up he is in his own affairs—so wrapped up, it seems, that
he overlooks some fairly important developments in Ernestine’s life. When she subtly
suggests that she has already told him about her upcoming graduation, he seems somewhat
ashamed of his oversight, but then he starts writing in his notepad. This ultimately highlights
the way he tends to disappear into his own thoughts instead of engaging with the world
around him.

Ermina continues sorting through the mail and comes across a letter from Father Divine.
Godfrey is overjoyed, eagerly opening the envelope but then passing it to Ernestine, who is
better at reading. Father Divine’s message says that he was moved by the honesty in
Godfrey’s previous letters, which is why he decided to respond. He tells Godfrey to stay
strong as a Black man living in poverty, adding that segregation and Jim Crow laws were
invented to “punish those who are in touch with God.” Father Divine adds that he doesn’t ask
much of his followers, other than that they remain celibate and pious. He insinuates that
Godfrey can rise above adversity by resisting temptation and remaining pious.

Father Divine’s remark that segregation and Jim Crow laws were invented to “punish those
who are in touch with God” frames the push for racial equality as something that is righteous
and pious. This makes sense, considering that the Peace Mission was a religious movement
that emphasized the importance of equality. In turn, Father Divine’s words help Godfrey
view his own struggles as a Black man living in a racist society as part of something bigger
than himself.

©2022 LitCharts LLC LitCharts Page 17

To break the awkward silence that has filled the apartment, Godfrey tells Lily that they tried
to find her when they moved to Brooklyn. They knew she lived in Harlem, but they had no
way of tracking her down—Harlem isn’t like a small town, where everybody knows each
other. To stop Lily from talking too much about the time they used to spend together,
Godfrey offers her a seat. As she moves into the room a bit more, though, she sees her sister’s
picture hanging on the wall and apologizes for not making it to the funeral.

Godfrey is anxious about reminiscing about the old days with Lily, suggesting that he doesn’t
want his daughters to hear about their history together. His reticence in this regard also
implies that he wants to leave his past life behind—he’s a devout religious man now, and it’s
clear that his former lifestyle didn’t adhere to the rigid standards he now has for himself and
for his daughters.

Godfrey notices that Ernestine is staring at Lily, so he tells her to stop. But Lily doesn’t mind.
She asks if her niece likes the suit she’s wearing, saying that she got it on Fifth Avenue,
where all the white women shop. She bought it to “spite” them, she says, since white women
don’t like when Black women manage to outdress them or look prettier than them. As the
conversation progresses, she says that she has become an etymologist. She had to study hard
to do this, but she suggests that it was worth it to break into a field full of white men. When
Ermina asks what an etymologist does, though, Lily simply says that she won’t bore them
with the details.

It's evident that Lily is interested in breaking down boundaries. She’s not one to simply
accept arbitrary rules about who can do what, which is why she makes a point of outdressing
white women. It’s also why she works to become an etymologist. It’s difficult to interpret her
eagerness to change the subject when Ermina asks what an etymologist is—as Lily develops
as a character throughout the play, it comes to seem as if she might exaggerate some of her
credentials, so it’s possible that she isn’t actually an etymologist. And yet, this reading runs
the risk of undermining her abilities and ultimately subjecting her to the same restrictive,
prejudiced mindset that she so admirably challenges. Either way, it’s obvious that Lily is a
free-thinking, independent Black woman whose way of responding to injustice stands in stark
contrast to Godfrey’s.

Lily makes a comment about how hungry she is, and though she half-heartedly tells Godfrey
and Ernestine not to go to any trouble on her behalf, she quickly accepts an offer to stay for
dinner. Before Ernestine goes to find some food, though, Lily asks her to come give her a
kiss, and when she’s in arm’s reach, she pinches her behind and comments on how big she
has gotten. “And look at those boobies!” she says, telling Ernestine to watch out because she
might end up drawing the attention of adult men. Bewildered, Ernestine hastily retreats to the
kitchen, covering her breasts with her arms.

Again, it’s overwhelmingly clear that Lily is not the type to adhere to Godfrey’s strict and
overprotective values. Whereas Godfrey is serious and somewhat sexually repressed, Lily is
full of life and willing to speak openly about romance and attraction. Her free- thinking
attitude will later bring itself to bear on Ernestine’s worldview and ultimately challenge the
restrictive worldview Godfrey has tried to force upon his daughters.

Lily asks Godfrey to take her bags in from the hall. He’s surprised she even brought bags in
the first place, but it soon becomes clear that she intends to stay. Sitting down, she asks
Godfrey for a drink, and he gravely informs her that they don’t keep alcohol in the house—
prompting her to make a joke about him becoming religious. She soon realizes, however, that
this is no joke: Godfrey has become very religious. She notes the picture of Father Divine on
the wall and puts the pieces together, asking if Divine is still preaching and presenting
himself as God to his followers. Godfrey defensively explains that Father Divine’s words
reached him when he was in a pit of despair in Florida, and that this is what motivated him to
move the family to Brooklyn.

Godfrey is protective of Father Divine and his teachings, since he essentially restructured his
entire life around those teachings. For Godfrey to second-guess Father Divine, then, would be
like second- guessing the ideas that now define his existence. In turn, Godfrey has no
stomach for Lily’s sarcastic tone, since any challenge to the Peace Mission Movement is like
a challenge to Godfrey’s entire way of being.

©2022 LitCharts LLC LitCharts Page 19

Lily tries to get Godfrey to rehash memories of old times they spent together in various bars,
but he refuses to participate. Instead, he shifts the conversation, asking if she’s still involved
in the Communist Party. She makes fun of him for talking about it like it’s a frightening
organization. She simply wants true equality, she explains, pointing out that capitalism puts
Black Americans in especially disenfranchised positions. Although everyone refers to the
threat of communism as “Red Scare,” she says, they should really call it “black scare.”

Although it was vilified in the United States during the 1950s, the Communist Party fiercely
advocated for justice and equality. As such, many progressive Americans were sympathetic
to the communist cause. In fact, the Communist Party even helped provide some of the
Scottsboro Boys (whom Godfrey mentions in the play’s prologue) with legal representation,
so the audience might think that Godfrey, too, would have a soft spot for the Party. However,
Godfrey is clearly like the many Americans who make a point of denouncing communism.
To that end, many people who resisted social change in the 20th century often unfairly
accused activists and progressives of engaging in nefarious communist activity, using this as
a quick and easy way to besmirch a person’s name in society. This kind of hysteria came to
be known as “Red Scare,” and since the Communist Party was outspokenly in favor of racial
justice and equality, Lily suggests that “Red Scare” could easily be called “black scare,”
implying that the country’s fear of communism is rooted in racism.

Godfrey doesn’t like Lily talking about communism in front of the girls, but Lily tells him to
relax. She claims to have promised her own mother that she would come look after the girls
in her sister’s absence. Godfrey loosens up a bit, but when Lily smiles at him, he quickly
looks away and writes something down in his notebook. She asks what he’s writing, and he
explains that he’s just jotting down questions he wants to ask Father Divine when he comes
to New York for the Holy Communion.

Godfrey is so devoted to Father Divine that he wants the man’s opinion on seemingly every
aspect of his life. He wants, in other words, to refract everything he encounters through the
lens of the Peace Mission Movement, desperately looking for guidance. It thus becomes clear
that Godfrey feels somewhat incapable of finding his own way forward in life—a good
indication that the loss of his wife has completely upended his ab

person’s life. In the first scene, for instance, Ernestine narrates

what it was like for the family to lose her mother, explaining
that the grief “wouldn’t leave [them] be.” But then her father,
Godfrey, moved the family to New York City in an attempt to
live closer to Father Divine, whose teachings helped him funnel
his sorrow into something else—namely, a deep sense of
religious faith and devotion. However, the play implies that
even the most seemingly rewarding and meaningful
distractions from grief are still just distractions and, thus, are no
substitute for genuinely working through and processing such
sorrow. Ernestine hints at this when she first meets Godfrey’s
new wife, Gerte, pointing out in shock that her mother hasn’t
even been dead for a full year. The implication here is that
Godfrey hasn’t given himself time to fully mourn his wife’s
death, instead trying to address his grief with the quick fix of
marrying somebody new. At the same time, though, the play
doesn’t necessarily cast doubt on the authenticity of Godfrey’s
love for Gerte (he genuinely seems to care for her), nor does it
propose what, exactly, is the best way for people to move on
after a loved one dies. In turn, the play simply outlines the
extreme difficulty of coping with loss, ultimately suggesting
that moving on is painful and challenging no matter how a
person goes about it.
CRITICAL THINKING AND OPEN-
MINDEDNESS
Crumbs From the Table of Joy examines how people
respond to perspectives that differ from their own.
Godfrey, for instance, has a strong negative reaction whenever
he comes into contact with his late wife’s sister, Lily’s,
progressive, communist worldview. His intense backlash is tied
to the anti-communist sentiment that was especially strong in
the United States during the 1950s (when the play is set). To be
branded a communist came with grave social consequences, as
evidenced by the fact that Godfrey’s coworkers stop talking to
him when his daughter Ernestine writes a school paper that
makes her teacher think the Crumb family is communist—a
good indication of just how quickly people in Godfrey’s
community judge one another for having even the slightest
association with communist ideas.
And yet, Lily points out that Ernestine’s essay doesn’t mean
she’s a communist—it just means she’s thinking critically about
the world. Her essay isn’t even specifically about communism;
it’s about the labor movement in the United States. What
Ernestine is most interested in is the simple goal of fairness and
equality, but her father still forbids Lily from talking to her
anymore about such matters, effectively subjecting his
daughter to the same narrow-minded, intolerant worldview
that everyone around him has modeled. In the end, though,
Ernestine continues to think critically about the world,
becoming a civil rights activist instead of adhering to her
father’s restricted worldview. The play celebrates her open-
minded exploration of challenging and unpopular ideas, but it
also illustrates how difficult it can be to think this way,
considering that Lily—a staunch communist, feminist, and racial
justice advocate—is harshly judged for her beliefs and ends up
dying alone. The play thus spotlights the benefits of open-
mindedly engaging in critical thought while also underlining the
unfortunate hazards of doing so in a society that often rejects
and vilifies people who challenge the status quo.
Symbols appear in teal text throughout the Summary and
Analysis sections of this LitChart.
THE GRADUATION DRESS
The graduation dress Ernestine sews for herself
symbolizes the sense of self-sufficiency and
confidence that she learns to cultivate. Lily teaches her that this
kind of willpower and independence is necessary for Black
women to embody if they want to take a stand against the
racist power structures at play in the United States. In the very
beginning of their relationship, Lily suggests to Ernestine that
self-presentation matters because it’s a way to challenge the
assumptions white people make about Black people—which is
why Lily makes a point of buying clothes from the stores where
wealthy white women shop, since outdressing these women
can be a “subversive” act. In keeping with this, it’s noteworthy
that Ernestine makes her own graduation dress. The effort she
puts into it comes to represent the kind of self-made drive that
she later applies to her college career, given that going to
college in the first place was something that was out of reach
for many Black women in the 1950s. And yet, Lily also says in a
moment of anger that it doesn’t matter what Ernestine wears
to graduation—a dress in and of itself, she argues, won’t make
Ernestine successful. What will make her successful, though, is
the self-sufficiency and personal agency that drives Ernestine
to make her own dress in the first place. In turn, the dress
comes to stand for the resourcefulness and resilience that
ultimately enable Ernestine to break down racial barriers and
strive toward unprecedented success.
THE NOTEPAD
The notepad Godfrey uses to write down questions
symbolizes an escapist desire to look toward other
people or belief systems as a way of avoiding confronting
hardship head-on. Throughout the play, Godfrey frequently
pauses in conversation to write something down, especially
when he’s having an uncomfortable conversation. It’s
eventually revealed that he’s writing down questions that he
wants to ask Father Divine when he finally meets him. This
SYMBOLSSYMBOLS
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